The present invention generally relates to an apparatus, a system and a method for crumpling paper. More specifically, the present invention relates to a container holding paper that dispenses through the container. The paper is crumpled while being dispensed from the container.
Crumpled paper is often desirable to be used as a material to cushion and/or protect an item or items during shipment. An item often shifts within a box or other package in which the item is placed and thus may incur damage. Crumpled paper may be inserted around the item placed in the box and/or the package to surround the item. If the item shifts during shipment, the item may be protected by the crumpled paper prior to contacting another surface, such as a side wall of the box in which the item is shipped, for example. Thus, the crumpled paper may cushion the item during shipment to protect the item from damage.
Without crumpled paper, the item may contact a side wall of the box in which the item is shipped and may be subjected to damage during shipment. Using crumpled paper as a cushioning material may prevent this undesirable result.
Dispensing of crumpled paper, however, is often difficult and/or time consuming and/or requires a great deal of space. Known systems and/or methods for dispensing crumpled paper may not adequately meet the needs of a small scale user and/or a home-based user. Known crumpled paper dispensation systems may be tailored to suit the needs of industrial operations and thus offer large volumes of crumpled paper, for example. To that end, such systems may involve sophisticated machinery with many moving parts. Further, such systems may be immovable due to size. Other known systems may use decorative and/or ornamental paper dispensation, or the dispensation of crumpled paper strings and/or strips, for example. Such applications may fail to meet the needs of the small scale user and/or the home-based user who intends to primarily use crumpled paper as a material to cushion items during shipment.
As an example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,131,902 to Levine et al. discloses a mechanism for producing crumpled paper and/or dunnage in strips. Other crumpled paper and/or dunnage making mechanisms and methods are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 8,202,209 to Cheich and U.S. Pat. No. 4,958,733 to Masuda. Levine et al. disclose an apparatus for crumpling and dispensing dunnage from a roll of stock paper material. The apparatus has a frame with a pair of side walls for guiding sheet paper from the roll of paper in a converging manner. The apparatus also has a box-like housing with an opening in alignment with a reduced dimension corrugated-shaped opening.
Known methods, apparatuses or systems for crumpling paper may use various moving parts including rollers for pulling paper and crushing and/or compacting the same. Such machinery may be large, expensive and/or immovable. Thus, a need exists for a dispenser that may crumple paper for use in an establishment and/or at home, for example.